The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is an independent agency of the U.S. government to protect the natural resources (e.g., air, water and land) and endangered species. It was created by President Richard Nixon in 1970 and is part of the executive branch of the government.[1] EPA reports directly to the president. The primary mission of the EPA is to protect human health and safeguard the natural environment (air, water and land) of the nation. The EPA was established at atime of new awareness of the environment, with the goal of combing into a single agency many of the existing federal government activities of research and development, monitoring, setting of standards, compliance and enforcement related to protection of the environment.

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Budget

Since 2000 the budget has held fairly steady at $7.6 to $8.4 billion (with no adjustment for inflation). In terms of objectives, 13% is budgeted for clean air and global climate change, 36% for clean and safe water, 24% for land preservation and restoration, 17% for healthy communities and ecosystems, and 11% for compliance and environmental stewardship.[2] In 2008 it has a staff of about 18,000 people in headquarters and departmental or divisional offices, 10 regional offices, and over 25 laboratories located across the nation. More than half of the staff are engineers, scientists and environmental protection specialists. The others include legal counsel, financial, public affairs and computer specialists.

Greenhouse gases

In December 2009 the EPA officially declared that six greenhouse gases, including carbon dioxide, "threaten the health and welfare of the American people". The decision could open the way for the Obama administration to impose its own curbs on emissions, although Congress may have the final say.

On April 2, 2007, the Supreme Court ruled that the EPA has the authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions. This was a rebuke to the Bush administration, which had called for voluntary reduction of the gases. [3].

Mercury

On 8 February, 2008, a federal appeals court struck down a mercury-control plan imposed by the Environmental Protection Agency. The court ruled that the Bush administration ignored the law when it imposed less stringent requirements on power plants to reduce mercury pollution, which scientists fear could cause neurological problems in 60,000 newborns a year.[4]

Global Warming

The EPA has ruled that CO2 is a health hazard and it is widely anticipated that the ruling will lead to legislation to control greenhouse gas emissions. The Competitive Enterprise Institute reported findings that countered EPA claims. The report was suppressed from public knowledge and the likely reason was politically motivated. [5]

DDT

An influential early act of the EPA was to ban DDT in the U.S. The reason was to protect numerous bird species and the harmless insects on which they depend for food.

Major laws administered by the EPA

The EPA administers over a dozen major environmental laws including:[6]

Clean Air Act

Clean Water Act

Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA, also known as Superfund) and Superfund Amendments and Reauthorization Act (SARA)

History

Kraft (2000) examines the rise and evolution of environmental politics since the 1960s. Originating as a movement built around the conservation of natural resources and an attempt to stave off air, water, and land pollution, environmentalism evolved into a much more sophisticated control regime, one that employed the Environmental Protection Agency to slow environmental degradation.

President Richard Nixon, on July 9, 1970, told Congress of his plan to create the EPA by combining parts of three federal departments, three bureaus, three administrations and many other offices into the new single, independent agency to be known as the Environmental Protection Agency. By the law at the time, Congress had 60 days to reject the proposal, but opinion was favorable and the reorganization took place without legislation. On December 2, 1970, the EPA was officially established and began operation under director William Ruckelshaus. The EPA began by consolidating 6550 employees from different agencies into a new agency with a $1.4 billion budget.

Kraft (2000) notes that despite its limited charter from 1970, over time EPA has expanded its regulatory function and jousted with the forces of business and economic development. Kraft considers the next major transition in environmental policy to be the process of insuring the "sustainability" of resources through a coalition of interests ranging from policymakers to business leaders, scholars, and individual citizens. At the turn of the 21st century, these often competing groups were wrestling with disparate environmental, economic, and social values.

Russell (1997) shows that from 1970 to 1993, the EPA devoted more of its resources to human health issues, notably cancer prevention, than to the protection of nonhuman species. The limited scope of environmental protection was due to a variety of reasons. An institutional culture favored human health issues because most employees were trained in this area. The emphasis on cancer came from the legal division's discovery that judges were more persuaded by arguments about the carcinogenicity of chemicals than by threats to nonhumans. The views of the agency leaders, who followed politically realistic courses, also played an important part in shaping the EPA's direction. Those supporting ecological issues acquired a new tool in the 1980s with the development of risk assessments so that advocates of ecological protection could use language framed by advocates of human health to protect the environment.